Zone Based Resource Allocation for OFDMA Systems

This paper investigates the performance benefits of different resource allocation strategies that take advantage of permutation zones specified in IEEE 802.16e-based OFDMA systems. In particular, we propose and investigate the benefits of a sub-zone scheduling approach where each permutation zone is partitioned into sub-zones that are used for scheduling subsets of eligible users according to their prevailing link quality. In the scenarios considered, the proposed sub-zone scheduling approach allows improvements in sector throughputs as high as 80% relative to a baseline IEEE 802.16e-based OFDMA system while maintaining the system outage at acceptable levels.